


Lasciate ogne speranza

by Sapphylicious



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Gen, Hell, I blame taking a class on The Divine Comedy, Nightmares, Purgatory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-21
Updated: 2014-01-21
Packaged: 2018-01-09 12:41:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1146107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphylicious/pseuds/Sapphylicious
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"If there is God, if there is freewill, then man is able to choose the opposite of God. Power, Wisdom, Love, gave man freewill; therefore Power, Wisdom, Love, created the gate of hell and the possibility of hell." – Dorothy Sayers (notes for The Divine Comedy, Part 1: Hell)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lasciate ogne speranza

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from the original Italian phrase, "Abandon every hope, you who enter here."

«Here one must leave behind all hesitation;  
here every cowardice must meet its death.»  
– Virgil at the gate of Hell (Dante's _Inferno_ )

 

"...And so, you decided to learn more about England and Christianity by reading this." Ciel brandished the hardcover book in one slim, white hand. His face may as well have been carved from porcelain for all the emotion it betrayed. "Is that right?"

"Indeed! An ingenious idea, wouldn't you agree? A fair exchange after all I've taught you about my country and faith!" Prince Soma said, or maybe 'gushed' would be a better term. Ciel cringed inwardly, and for a moment he regarded the book as a shield between himself and Soma's idiotic enthusiasm.

"Whatever you choose to waste your time with isn't my concern," Ciel began, hoping that the throbbing behind his eyes wasn't a precursor to another headache. "But for one thing, this is an _Italian_ work of literature. If you want to learn about England, read a history book. If you want to learn about Christian faith, read the Bible. Don't bother me with this—" _trash_ , he almost said, but that might raise questions. With a slight curl of his lip he ordered, "Sebastian, help Prince Soma find more suitable reading material."

Ciel held the book out, expecting it to be taken from his hand and returned to the library, but the hooded look in Sebastian's simmering red eyes made Ciel's fingers tighten reflexively on the cover. "Right away, my lord." Then, to Ciel's muted outrage, Sebastian left him holding the damn book while he whisked Soma and the ever-present Agni out of the room faster than Ciel could order him to _wait and take this wretched thing away_.

Dante's _Divine Comedy_ hit the desk with a thump, followed by a double pounding from Ciel's balled-up fist. His uncovered eye glared at the embossed lettering of the title, and directly below it: _Inferno_.

It was rubbish, Ciel knew. Nothing more than the fanciful designs of an egotistical Italian poet from hundreds of years ago, outdated and irrelevant. Fiction, however it was dressed, was still fiction in the end. What did he care for the imagined Hell of a long-dead man? It did not bear thinking about.

Ciel braced his elbows on the desk and dropped his head into his hands, fingers pressing against his aching temples. Sebastian would get him something for the pain when he returned, and remove the book _as ordered_ , and the day would continue like any other day until finally it grew dark.

Resolute, Ciel waited.

#

He did not wake to the aroma of freshly-brewed tea and Sebastian's trim silhouette against the golden light of morning. Instead his chambers were cold and dark—very cold, in fact, and Ciel sluggishly drew the blankets up over his head, tucking his face into his pillow to seek warmth. Sleep evaded him, though, and an uneasy irritation woke his nerves like prickling along his skin. Almost like a sixth sense, developed after many trials.

There was no reason his own room should be allowed to be this uncomfortable, and Sebastian's sense of humor, while decidedly wicked and often in poor taste, was not so petty. Ciel cautiously propped himself up, feeling under his pillow for the cold, solid grip of the revolver there. Eased by the weight of that comfort in his hand, he peered around the room.

It wasn't so dark; some light filtered in through an open window, also accounting for the temperature, but the sight of the fluttering curtains and glimpse of outside chilled him from the inside out. Ciel exhaled slowly, his breath making a silvery plume, and a frosty breeze rustled his hair. He remained still, straining to see or hear, but nothing else moved and the only sound that reached his ears was the faint whistle of the wind.

His lips parted, started to form around the familiar summons: "Seba—" but the rest was air, intangible and powerless. His fingers flew to his throat, feeling their icy touch and then the vibration of his whisper. "What?"

In answer, the wind began to moan.

Ciel sat unmoving where he was, hands curling tightly and bloodlessly close to his body. He considered calling for Sebastian again, but something like laughter amid the lamenting said, _no, not here_.

"It's a dream," he said with a rough edge of disgust. "I'm dreaming because of that miserable book." He drew his knees up and hugged them for warmth, keeping a wary watch on the window from the corner of his eye.

Words reached him, perhaps carried on the wind like something from the past, something he heard before, in Sebastian's amused, liquid tones. _The human imagination, the endless possibility of it, is a potent thing, my lord. Dangerous, live, and binding._ Ciel recalled his smile, all sly elegance, and the slight narrowing of his eyes, his face a portrait made in the likeness of a memory.

"Stop it," he snarled at the noise outside, at the dark sigh in his head, unfolding his limbs in a decisive snap and stretch. His bare feet hit the floor and the revolver was firmly grasped in his hand. He stalked to the window and drew aside the length of shivering curtain, braced for any kind of horror.

The view outside was as it always was, moonlit and misty. He saw tree branches stir, naked limbs trembling, but nothing else disturbed the pockets of shadow below. Up in the sky, the moon smiled sideways at him. Ciel let the curtain fall, let his arm relax, and then a touch upon his waist made his insides turn to ice.

"What a romantic night this is, sweet robin."

Ciel half-twisted, half-swung, and his heart hammered so violently it felt like his ribs would crack under the barrage. He didn't think, just brought the gun up in both hands, pressed the muzzle to Viscount Druitt's awfully tangible chest, and squeezed the trigger at the same time his throat squeezed out, " _Sebastian!_ "

The recoil sent a shock up his thin arms and dreadfully warm blood spattered on them. His grip became tacky with it. Ciel stared at the vivid red stain that spread around a grisly hole in torn fabric, the same scandalous color that dripped in rivulets from Druitt's dreamily smiling lips. The red of the blood and the gold of his hair were shocks of color in a gray world.

"Ah, robin. Is it such a good idea to call for that one here?"

The air stirred, drawing outward instead of blowing inward, and the Viscount fell—no, was pulled through the window, and not gently, like he was weightless and worthless. He was joined by other shapes coalescing in the mist, buffeted by the wind. Baron Kelvin's mass was swept along, accompanied by the jaunty figures of his children. They flew and tumbled through the air in one direction, but with grim faces as they were abruptly yanked the other way, sharp turns that sent arms and legs snapping. Ciel recognized the spindly forms, the garishly painted faces. 

At first they paid him no mind, but then Joker called out, "Smile!" His voice caroled a cheer that didn't match his expression, and suddenly all attention narrowed in on Ciel.

Unlike the others, Kelvin's face split in a broad, delighted grin.

Ciel reached for the window and slammed it shut, fingers trembling with the latch. "It's a dream, it's a dream, it's a dream," he muttered, closing the curtains. Damn his imagination! The glass rattled, and Ciel turned and ran.

"Sebastian!" he shouted again, felt the air in his lungs go stale immediately with his next breath. "Bard! Maylene! Finnian!" This was his household, the Phantomhive household, and he knew it was well-defended. "Tanaka!"

His rush slowed when he came to the stairwell, panting from exertion. His hands were empty, he'd dropped the revolver in his hurry to shut Kelvin and his troupe out, and they were sticky on the rail with Druitt's blood. He descended the stairs partway, then stopped. No one was coming, or going to come. The house was empty—he was lord here and he _knew_.

The Earl of Phantomhive stood there alone, spatters of red standing out lurid and indecent on his nightshirt, feet bare and numb to the cold. Dressed not in dignity, but held together by skin and bone, clutching the shreds of his wits. Lord of all and nothing it seemed, and his white-knuckled grip on the rail made the metal band of his ring bite into his flesh. Normally loose around his thumb, the Phantomhive heirloom now clutched it like a vice. Ciel took it between his fingers and tugged. Expecting resistance, he was unprepared for it to fly off, slipping from his grasp. The sapphire glittered, reflecting light where there was none, and Ciel watched with baited breath as it tumbled from sight. Straining his ears, he heard the faintest chime of it hitting the floor.

_Leave it_ , part of him said, the same part that had thrown its shattered remains away in front of Elizabeth, but he rubbed the bare base of his thumb and was hurrying down the stairs in a blink. As soon as he set foot upon the black and white tiles, another chime—this one with a slightly heavier tone—halted him in place.

It was followed by another, and another, until the hall was immersed in an irregular, metallic pinging, and the sound of shuffling beneath that. A glint of gold flashed before his eyes and bounced on the tile, rolling to a stop by his toe. Ciel bent and picked up the coin with Queen Victoria's youthful portrait depicted on the side. More coins fell—gold sovereigns like the one he let slip from awestruck fingers, silver crowns and shillings, copper pennies, farthings, even one quarter farthings—they all rained down.

A hand grazed his ankle and Ciel stumbled backward with a strangled cry. Lord West barely spared him a glance before scooping up the coins littering the floor, pooling them in his grasping hands like water for a man dying of thirst. He crawled shamelessly on hands and knees to sweep them into a pile.

Slender brown fingers suddenly darted into the collection, and Meena was there, her long hair hanging in her face. West shoved her rudely with a mute snarl. "Why do you hoard them?" she cried, flinging a handful of silver and gold at his face. As soon as they left her grasp, a look of horror twisted her exotic features.

"Why do you squander?" West demanded, equally aghast as they both strove to gather more and more, heedless of the pummeling their bodies took from the metallic downpour.

Ciel forgot his ring and made a dash through the hall. He held his arm over his head to ward off the pelting blows, but they never landed. The sound rang loud all around him, and he skidded on the coin-strewn tiles, but he was not struck once. Then the smooth handle of a door was in reach, and he pulled, was greeted by a frosty gale and pallid light. As he caught his breath the door boomed shut behind him.

The garden was desolate and withered, outlined by a false dawn the color of ash. Gray dust and dry stalks all around; even the inside of Ciel's mouth tasted chalky as he treaded quietly through the dead skeletons of wild growth. The breath of the wind rattled through everything like bones. There was no mist; no fleeting shapes, but the cold still crept through to fill his veins with ice. A layer of sparkling frost made the stems of a twisting shrub brittle and wicked. They were in his way.

Ciel grasped a thin branch and snapped it clean. For a moment it felt almost warm clutched in his hand, and he held tight to the delicate twig, felt it break into tiny pieces that stabbed into soft flesh. Though he willed it, his grip would not loosen. He had to pry the fingers apart with his other hand, revealing a pale dust that clung to his skin and the welling drops of fresh blood. The wounds bled more than was normal for mere pinpricks, filling his palm with a small puddle of viscous liquid. Yet it didn't hurt.

Curious and trance-like, Ciel slowly rotated his wrist, tipping the palmful so the blood trickled down. Some of it dribbled down his arm, staining his sleeve fresh, and the rest fell upon thick clusters of newly-sprouted green leaves. Where a drop touched, a red flower bloomed, full and somehow vulgar in the way it was spread. At first he thought they were roses, but the soft curves of the petals were wrong. Thick, gold-tipped stamens were thrust out from the center.

"The 'rose of winter'," sighed a familiar voice, one that did not make Ciel's gut clench with dread.

"Aunt Ann," he said with a wave of relief, turning to the woman sitting by his side. Her appearance was startling—dressed not in the vibrant red of her title, but the white she was buried in. She sat elegantly upon the ground, skirt spread out with lace peeking from the edges. Her hair was long, its hue faded, and her eyes were hidden behind a forelock of dulled crimson.

"These camellias are a lovely addition to your garden," she continued as if not hearing him. "They represent admiration, success, tastefulness..." Her fingertips caressed a flower. "But did you know...?"

She cupped the whole thing and it fell away from the branch, filling her palm, made into an offering.

"They're considered unlucky in the Orient. Look, just like a decapitated head!"

Her laughter was high and girlish, and when she tipped her head back the thick hair concealing her face fell aside in a wash of red.

Her eyes were sewn shut.

Ciel grabbed the camellia flower and crushed it, smothering the waxy-smooth petals. "Enough," he said in a low growl, the word echoing maddeningly in his head. _Enough, enough, enough._

"My cute nephew," Madam Red interrupted the stream of his thoughts with a smile upon her colorless lips, eyes stretching at the seams that marched across them with a surgeon's precision. "When you reached for that single spider's thread, did you ever fear getting caught in the web?"

"No." He opened his fingers and let the crumpled petals fall. They were snatched away by the wind. "It's a web of my own making."

"The more fool you."

"I know what I'm doing," Ciel snapped.

Madam Red's face fell, closed lids twitching. "Yes," she admitted, a tragedy in one word. It threatened to suffocate him.

"I—" but she shushed him.

"I'm waiting," she said, her expression finely crafted in mingled agony and joy. "Would you wait with me? Listen, do you hear it?"

Ciel listened, and heard a voice calling him. It didn't come on the wind—it persevered despite the howling against it. "Ciel!" a girl's voice cried, a clear but distant bell.

"Elizabeth!" He spun and searched for her face in the manor's windows, but they all remained dark.

"Ciel!"

Her call pulled at him, daring him to raise his head to the gray sky. The grinning moon was nowhere to be found. "Elizabeth, where are you?"

"She's not here, I assure you." Gone was Madam Red with her deeply-knowing, unseeing gaze. A full camellia blossom the color of passionate red dropped to the feet of he who replaced her, and Sebastian inclined himself in a stately bow, never less than perfect. "Sir."

Ciel clenched his fist to keep from grabbing the immaculate collar that was just within reach. "Where have you been?"

"By your side, my lord." Ciel could see the vulpine curve of his mouth. Sebastian didn't mask it. "As always."

That bastard. "Never mind. Elizabeth—"

"Certainly isn't _here_ ," he repeated with the expression he always wore when something amused him terribly. "You know I don't lie."

"Can't. You can't lie, not to me," Ciel corrected. The quirk of Sebastian's smile conceded the point. "Fine, then. How do I leave here?"

For a moment, the air between them grew thick. Then Sebastian gestured with fluid grace and utmost courtesy. "I believe the young master may exit through the gate over there."

"You are an excruciating pain," Ciel told him curtly as he went. This time the unruly tangles of the garden scraped away from his path, shrinking and shivering dry limbs and crackling leaves. The wind began to soften to a sweet croon, raising the hair on the back of Ciel's neck. Sebastian was a silent presence behind him. Ciel turned around to look—

The garden was gone, the wind no more, and Sebastian had vanished. Instead there was the altar, wet with splashes of blood, the iron cages, and flickering candle flames. "What's going on?" When he stepped he could have sworn he heard the cold jangle of chain links and feel the cuff of metal around his ankle. His chest grew tight and his breaths grew shallow.

One moment the amphitheater was empty, silent, and then the next it was crowded with cloaked and masked people, filling the place with their raucous enjoyment. Quiet, then loud. Stale air, then smoke and blood. Ciel struggled to draw breath amid the dizzying start and stop, start and stop. Too many hands touching him, pulling his hair, pressing him down, holding him still. The searing pain and acrid stench of burned flesh. Blackness, almost a relief, for just a scant second.

His eyes snapped open and he inhaled sharply. He was on his back. A shadow moved above him—the masked man or the mad doctor, he couldn't tell, it didn't matter—with gleaming knifepoint raised. It came down, piercing him open, and his lungs filled with liquid. He truly couldn't breathe now, drowning in his own blood, feeling it coat his throat and the inside of his mouth.

Yet all Ciel could think was, _nothing's changed._

"Seba—" He turned his cheek and spat a mouthful of copper liquid, grimacing.

_By your side, my lord._

"Sebastian." The name was hoarsely-spoken, but firm for all that, and wet with blood.

_As always._

Everything in him constricted, then burst forth ready to rip, tear, rend. 

"Kill them!"

He laid there in the center, chest heaving, and listened to the whirlwind of wet sounds and guttural screams. A massacre of his making, for all that he did not touch them. The contract in his right eye flared pain, like it had been drawn in fire, and he saw it burned across his vision. He saw Kelvin, the doctor, the lifeless children. The command raged from him, as it did then. As it had always done.

_"Kill them!"_

_"Burn it! Turn everything to ash!"_

Ciel's eyes stung with tears and the sudden explosions of light and blistering heat. He rubbed frantically at them and tried to see beyond the blaze. Everything was crumbling and the flames consumed it all. They darted at his own feet. But he didn't even have to say a word before he was being lifted away.

"Shall I put it out?"

Ciel rested his head against the crook of Sebastian's neck, on the black of his coat and the white of his skin. "No use," he said, the words scratched raw from his throat and his small body languid with exhaustion. "It's already burning." A hand stroked feather-light through his hair.

"As you wish, my lord."

#

"My lord?"

"Nngh." Ciel turned over and fumbled blind for a moment as the sun's rays danced too merrily for his liking. The delicate scent of tea (a floral hint of Darjeeling, his acute senses informed him) gave him warm reassurance of his surroundings, and he finally blinked his eyes open to see Sebastian leaning over him. A gloved hand pressed against his forehead.

"Are you feeling unwell?"

Ciel batted the hand away. "I'm fine," he said, short and clipped. "Get on with it."

Sebastian made no comment, not even with an arched brow, but proceeded with serving breakfast and relaying the daily schedule. Ciel listened half-heartedly while he sipped his tea, taking comfort in the sweet fragrance and flavor.

"Sebastian," he said when he set the cup down. He might have interrupted and didn't care. "What..." 

But he couldn't finish. It was a question Ciel never asked, something that did not bear thinking about. He shook his head, indicating the termination of his thought.

Sebastian smiled, slow and unassuming while he blithely answered, "'Why this is hell, nor am I out of it'."

Ciel covered his face and groaned. The only thing he hated more than Dante's _Inferno_ was Marlowe's _Doctor Faustus_.

Humming and tapping his chin thoughtfully, Sebastian remarked, "Perhaps I've been remiss in the finer points of your education. Such works of literature should garner more appreciation, young master. How about we fit in some reading of Milton today?"

"Absolutely not."

He was then saved—in a manner of speaking—from continuing the discussion by Soma bursting into his chamber.

"Ciel! There are so many versions, which one am I supposed to read?" To Ciel's mounting distress, Soma was waving around three different versions of the Bible.

#

"Ah, how clumsy of me."

There was no one else present as Sebastian bent down to retrieve the holy book and slide it into place with the others on the shelf. Tugging off what remained of his glove, he calmly regarded the angry red blisters that had risen on his palm and along each long finger. Well, he'd almost made it. The pain was insignificant—well worth the disappointment on Ciel's face when he collected the Bibles (obediently under very strict orders) without a word or glance of protest.

Though he did sigh a little as he tucked the ruined glove into his pocket. It seemed that he went through those rather uncommonly fast. He supposed most butlers didn't get their hands, hmm, _dirty_ as frequently as Sebastian did. Flexing the injured hand experimentally, he hoped the blisters healed soon or else he might ruin another glove by bleeding through it. He could feign injury in some innocent manner if that turned out to be the case, but what a disgrace to his reputation. He simply had to be careful for the rest of the day.

Ever dutiful, Sebastian spared a few minutes to tidy up the library. It had suffered a bit through Soma's ravaging, though Agni had likely performed moderate damage control. A very handy man, that one. He presented no impediment for now.

Gathering up stray books to be shelved, Sebastian paused at a familiar cover. He'd already returned this one to its proper place the other day. Soma must have dug it up again like a dog with a bone.

Feeling capricious, and because Ciel appeared to have been quite preoccupied with the book last night, Sebastian flipped it open to the beginning of canto iii.

"Per me si va ne la città dolente / per me si va ne l'etterno dolore / per me si va tra la perduta gente."

_Through me the way into the suffering city,_  
Through me the way to the eternal pain,  
Through me the way that runs among the lost. 

Sebastian's smile possessed a crescent's thinness, pale and sharp.


End file.
